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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22847803">What You Do For Love</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/icewhisper/pseuds/icewhisper'>icewhisper</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood &amp; Manga</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen, M/M, Maes Hughes Lives, Multi, Truth is an asshole</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 17:21:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,992</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22847803</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/icewhisper/pseuds/icewhisper</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He wished he’d been aware enough to see the moment Roy had made the decision. Wished he’d had the composure to see Roy reach into his pocket with bloody fingers for the chalk he always kept. <i>Just in case I don’t have my gloves</i>, Roy always used to tell him. <i>You never know when you might need it.</i> He hadn’t seen it, but he’d leant into it when Roy pressed a harsh kiss to his temple and he’d listened to Roy’s barked order for him to check on Gracia and the other driver that had hit them.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Gracia Hughes/Maes Hughes, Gracia Hughes/Maes Hughes/Roy Mustang, Maes Hughes &amp; Roy Mustang, Maes Hughes/Roy Mustang</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>191</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Creative Chaos Discord Recs</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>What You Do For Love</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Two years later, Maes still only remembers it in flashes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sun shining in their faces.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Elicia babbling happy in Gracia’s lap in the front seat.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy grinning at him from the back seat when he glanced over his shoulder for just a </span>
  <em>
    <span>second</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The harsh impact of another car.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Flipping.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gracia unconscious, head laid out next to blood and broken glass.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy kicking the back door open and forcing his way out while Maes screamed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Elicia – tiny, perfect Elicia – on the asphalt outside, her tiny body bloody and broken.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He remembered, vaguely, that he’d checked Gracia for a pulse before he’d squeezed his body through his broken window to get to Roy. That his arm had been dangling useless at his side, but he hadn’t been able to feel the pain.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“She’s breathing,” he remembered telling Roy in a panic when he saw his daughter’s chest rising and falling. Roy had been bleeding from a gash in his forehead, blood spilling down into his eyes. He remembered wondering if Roy could see through it. “She’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>breathing</span>
  </em>
  <span>. We need a doctor.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There wasn’t time. Objectively, he’d known there wasn’t time, but his daughter was a broken mess in front of him – God, she was a </span>
  <em>
    <span>baby</span>
  </em>
  <span>, her first birthday was next week – and his wife was bleeding in the mangled car behind him. There was no objectivity, just panic and desperation and his best friend too scared to touch the little girl in front of him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wished he’d been aware enough to see the moment Roy had made the decision. Wished he’d had the composure to see Roy reach into his pocket with bloody fingers for the chalk he always kept. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Just in case I don’t have my gloves</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Roy always used to tell him. </span>
  <em>
    <span>You never know when you might need it. </span>
  </em>
  <span>He hadn’t seen it, but he’d leant into it when Roy pressed a harsh kiss to his temple and he’d listened to Roy’s barked order for him to check on Gracia and the other driver that had hit them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The other driver was dead.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Gracia was still unconscious, but he used his one good arm to pull her from the car and lay her down away from the glass.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d turned around when he saw the crackling light of alchemical discharge. Not the red-orange that usually accompanied Roy’s fire, he’d realized dimly, but the more typical blue-white.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy’s hands on the ground, palms flat against the circle he’d drawn around Elicia.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy’s dark eyes looking up at him, scared and begging for an apology, but </span>
  <em>
    <span>determined</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d realized in the last second what Roy had done, had opened his mouth to scream, but there was a flash and when it cleared, Elicia was crying in the middle of the circle and Roy’s arm…</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>arm</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Blood.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy’s mouth gaping open in shock, like he hadn’t registered it – hadn’t registered the </span>
  <em>
    <span>loss</span>
  </em>
  <span> – because his arm was gone. Blood was pouring from what was still connected to his shoulder and he’d </span>
  <em>
    <span>done it</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He’d done the one thing he’d promised Maes he’d never do. He’d </span>
  <em>
    <span>promised</span>
  </em>
  <span>, the two of them curled up in an apartment full of unspeakable things, he’d promised he’d never cross that line.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He remembered scrambling to get his jacket off and holding it against the stump while Roy pushed at him. “The circle,” Roy had gasped. “The circle. You gotta get rid of it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He scrubbed it away with that goddamn jacket and Roy’s blood.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Vomited when he was done and cried so hard he thought he’d throw up again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What were you thinking?” he’d asked Roy later when they were at the hospital. His arm had been put into plaster. Gracia’s hair had been cut so the doctors could stitch up an ugly gash at the back of her head. The cut along Roy’s hairline had been stitched, blood cleared away, and the stump bandaged.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The doctors had called it a clean amputation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They said Roy had been </span>
  <em>
    <span>lucky</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They said Elicia had been lucky that she’d escaped without injury.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d clutched Roy’s hand so tight, he thought he’d break it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You know why,” Roy had told him softly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thank you,” he’d sobbed and pressed a trembling kiss to Roy’s forehead while Gracia slept in the next bed. “Thank you…”</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span>They never told Gracia what Roy had done, hadn’t thought they could burden her with that kind of knowledge. In the chaos of the accident – so much blood and carnage, Maes hadn’t been able to look at case photos for months after – everyone had just assumed whatever mangled mess of Roy’s arm had been cut away had been lost. Misplaced. Thrown away.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The papers called it a bloody accident, mourning the driver who’d died and expressing gratefulness for the family that had survived.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The military paid for Roy to get a new arm, all bright and shiny metal that got attached to his shoulder. It left scars around where they’d anchored it and Roy had been back and forth to the doctors for months after. He’d still, technically, only been on desk duty when he and Riza had boarded a train to Resembool and came back with haunted eyes and a refusal to tell Maes about the children he’d met.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Didn’t realize the full story until he saw that same haunted look Ed got sometimes when he looked at his brother and he </span>
  <em>
    <span>understood</span>
  </em>
  <span>. The hows and the whys, he didn’t know, but the missing limbs. The way Ed clapped to use his alchemy, same as Roy could if he didn’t resolutely wear his gloves the way he always had.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>People didn’t ask about Ed’s strange ability.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy didn’t want people asking about his and pretended he didn’t have it at all.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He met Winry and smiled tightly while she went on about automail.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Pretended that the sight of Roy’s didn’t always make him want to scream.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He stared at the thing with his wife’s face and hoped Roy wouldn’t try it again. He didn’t know what Roy had seen at the Gate the first time, but he didn’t think it would be kind to him a second.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He didn’t want to be the reason Roy lost anything else.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Ed didn’t know?” he asked, surprised, after the Promised Day when Roy had slipped into his hospital room with bandaged hands and tired eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy shook his head. “Bradley hadn’t known, at least,” he offered, as if it was some kind of </span>
  <em>
    <span>victory</span>
  </em>
  <span>. They’d wondered for years if the man – the damn </span>
  <em>
    <span>Homunculi</span>
  </em>
  <span>, apparently – had figured out the truth and simply never said anything. “They were as surprised as Fullmetal was when I ended up there. They’d thought I was a good </span>
  <em>
    <span>potential</span>
  </em>
  <span> sacrifice.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maes didn’t say how stupid it was, that Roy looked goddamned </span>
  <em>
    <span>satisfied</span>
  </em>
  <span> about it. He was still recovering from getting </span>
  <em>
    <span>shot</span>
  </em>
  <span> and the doctors said he wasn’t supposed to be stressed, because he’d been </span>
  <em>
    <span>comatose</span>
  </em>
  <span> up until a few days ago, but there was Roy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As whole as he was ever going to be.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Battered and bruised and </span>
  <em>
    <span>stabbed</span>
  </em>
  <span>, but alive.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He reached up, tugged Roy down by the collar, and kissed him like he hadn’t since they’d been Academy students, because he could have lost him again. He could have lost him again and he was so tired of pretending that he didn’t love the man who had given up a part of himself for his daughter.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy kissed him back with the same kind of intensity Maes remembered and tangled his flesh hand in Maes’ hair before he pulled away. “Maes, Gracia-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“-has known for years,” Gracia said behind him, teasing. They both jumped. “Neither of you were ever good liars.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maes flushed, embarrassed and guilty, because Gracia had asked him about it once after Roy’s automail surgery when he’d paced the hospital’s waiting room for hours and chewed at his nails until they bled. She’d looked at him, as understanding as she ever was and too good for him, and said it was okay to love Roy too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then, he noticed the way Gracia had gone around to Roy’s side and laid a knowing hand on the automail arm.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Truly horrible liars,” she told them again and leaned over to kiss Roy’s cheek the way she always had. “I’m glad you’re okay. Dr. Marcoh is looking for you, by the way. Something about your hands.”</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span>“Are you mad I didn’t have him fix my arm too?” Roy asked him one night months later when they were both naked except for the sheet around their waist and Gracia was sleeping next to them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maes tensed, but he lit his cigarette and took a long pull from it. “Why would I be?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because you hate it,” Roy said plainly. “I’m not stupid.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You won’t touch it,” Roy pointed out. “And you flinch if I touch you with it.” He shifted, rolling closer to Maes so he could pluck the cigarette from his fingers. “I know why you hate it, Maes, but the reason you hate it is the reason I </span>
  <em>
    <span>don’t</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You promised you’d never-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And because I broke it, Elicia’s sleeping in her room right now,” he said softly. “We both know she wasn’t going to make it to a hospital. I don’t regret what I did and I don’t think you do either, but I do think you hate yourself for it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wanted to say Roy was wrong, but he couldn’t. Gracia was right, he thought morosely, he’d always been a horrible liar. “It reminds me of it,” he admitted after a long minute. “You could have died trying to save her.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I could have died in Ishval. You could have died in a phone booth,” he countered. “I knew the risks when I did it and it was my choice, Maes. If I don’t regret it, you shouldn’t.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re a self-loathing pain in my ass about everything </span>
  <em>
    <span>but</span>
  </em>
  <span> this,” he griped weakly, but he leaned in and kissed him. Took a fortifying breath before he laced his fingers through metal ones. It wasn’t the same as the hand that had been there before, but he hadn’t expected it to be. The arm that had been there had been left behind at the Gate with a monster Roy refused to talk about. “It scares me. The arm.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sorry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy shook his head, but it was Gracia who groaned and kicked him as she rolled over. “Go to bed,” she whined at them both. “And put out the cigarette.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy laughed and released Maes’ hand so he could reach over to poke her. “So much for sleeping.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I </span>
  <em>
    <span>would be</span>
  </em>
  <span> if you two would be quiet.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Roy rolled his eyes, but the smile he gave Maes was fond and this thing was so new. He and Roy had been like putting on an old sweater and realizing it still fit the way it always had, but Roy and Gracia were new. They were still testing the waters and Roy was still more his than his-and-Gracia’s, but they were figuring it out. And unlike him, Gracia had never flinched at the cool slide of Roy’s arm.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ll try,” he whispered to Roy as they settled down, because it was the best he could offer right now. He didn’t think he’d ever </span>
  <em>
    <span>like</span>
  </em>
  <span> Roy’s arm or see it the way Roy and Gracia did, but if he could just learn to look at it without the lingering guilt and horror... </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Should I put my shirt back on?” Roy asked and it was the first time he’d actually asked instead of just doing it. He’d thought it was just an odd habit Roy had picked up since the last time they’d been together, but he realized slowly that Roy had been doing it for </span>
  <em>
    <span>him</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He tried not to feel guilty about that, too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No,” he said. “Not tonight.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Another, maybe, but not tonight.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The End</span>
</p>
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